As humanity progresses, we find new ways to make our lives safer and more convenient. In a short period of time, we were able to go from planes to rockets and black-and-white photos to a solar powered security camera.
With recent advancements, we can create more innovative equipment that is both convenient and keeps us safe. One of these technologies is automation home security.
What is home automation?
Home automation is a feature that lets you control and monitor devices in your home from anywhere in the world, using a handheld device and the internet.
Some equipment this feature can control are sprinklers, thermostats, smart ovens, etc. Some items used to better your security include smart lights, security cameras, doorbells, motion sensors, etc. All of these make our lives more convenient, secure, comfortable, and energy efficient.
How does home automation increase your security?
Several automation devices exist to provide a range of security measures. All to provide the most convenient ways to keep you and your home from harm’s way. Some of them are
1) Smart doorbells
They are marketed as devices that connect to the front of your door. Many smart doorbells have an automatic video recording installed and monitor the outside of your home. It, therefore, allows you to see, hear and record whoever is at your door—making it a useful tool for home security.
2) Motion sensor lights
Motion sensor lights are often placed outside the home. They usually work by using a passive infrared (PIR) that detects infrared rays. Once someone passes through your home, the motions go off, and the light turns on, giving you a clear view of potential intruders.
Types of motion sensor
There are two main types of motion sensors, i.e., active sensors and passive systems ( also referred to as passive infrared or pyroelectric sensors).
Active sensors
These use energy (light or sound) to detect changes in the environment. There are different ways to create an active sensor. Some of them include the following:
Light beam
This involves a break of light. It is very common for stores to have a beam of light crossing a room near the door and a photosensor on the other side of the room. When a customer or any individual breaks that beam, a photo sensor detects the change in light and rings a bell.
Radar
These emit microwave radio energy. The most common example of this is grocery store doors.
Here, a box above the door sends out microwave radio energy that bounces back. When someone moves into the microwave field, the amount of waves changes, and this distribution causes the doors to open. Once the person moves from the area, the waves return to normal, and the door closes.
Ultrasonic sound waves can produce the same results.
Passive sensor
Unlike active radars, these do not send out any pulses or beams. Instead, it uses ambient signals like light, vibration, heat, and radiation to detect movement. For it to detect a human, it needs to be sensor sensitive to people’s body temperature. Therefore, passive sensors are typically sensitive in the range of 8 to 12 micrometers.
Once the sensor notices human temperature around, it sends a signal to alert the owners.
3) Smart security cameras
Smart cameras are often wireless. These devices perform the same function average cameras do and more. You can monitor your home from anywhere around the world. A smart camera records what happens in the house and uses a wifi network to send videos to your device.
Of course, placing the cameras at strategic points in your home is crucial. This way, there wouldn’t be any blind spots that intruders take advantage of.
4) Glass break detector
These provide additional security to your home. They are designed to notify you when someone tries to break into your home through glass windows or doors. You can even set the glass break sensors to trigger video recording. Allowing you to receive videos and images of your home intruder.
There are two basic types of glass break sensors:
Acoustic Glass-Break Sensors
These sensors will notify you when it hears the sound of glass breaking.
Shock Glass-Break Sensors
It identifies break-ins by vibrations. You should keep the sensors directly on the glass windows or doors to use them. Any movement of the glass and door set off the detector and notifies you.
5) Smart fire detector
A smart fire detector is an updated function to normal ones. They notify you when a fire breaks out, keeping you and your home safe. Some models are capable of detecting fires and carbon monoxide (a colorless and odorless gas).
Additionally, it is able to distinguish between smoke from fire and fumes from cooking, shower steam, and burned food.
Conclusion
Technology has come so far and will continue to develop way into the future. It brings innovative ways to further simplify and adds to the security of humankind, not just on the industrial scale but on an individual scale as well. Advancing and updating features and devices that can already be found in most homes. And many speculate we are just scratching the surface of what our future could look like.